Gone to the Forest: A Novel by Katie Kitamura Page B

recovered her distance.
    Her eyes were once again blank. Not that Tom knew or understood. No
     details—the details sickened him. He knew that something had happened, that there
     had been an incident. In this backdrop of new catastrophe. He saw how the girl was and
     that was enough. He looked at her again.
    “Please.”
    She shook her head. She sighed: the sound like her lungs had broken.
    “Do you know—”
    She stopped. The girl meant nothing to him and even so. Tom swallowed and
     waited for her to speak. Her face wasvague and she did not look at
     him when she spoke, her eyes wandered and wandered instead.
    “The Rheas. The birds are big. The size of humans. They live on
     land. Too big to fly—”
    She paused. Her brow crossed with confusion. She started again.
    “A male Rhea has a dozen mates. He impregnates one bird and then
     moves on to the next. But he risks his life in defense of all his offspring.”
    She paused again. He had no idea what she was talking about. She shook her
     head.
    “No. I wanted to tell you something different. Something about the
     Rheas.”
    She stopped and seemed to think about it. She picked loose a dry piece of
     skin from her lip.
    “When the men fight to assert dominance it goes like
     this—”
    She cleared her throat and closed her eyes.
    “When the male Rheas fight to assert dominance it goes like this.
     They lock necks and spin around in circles. Because they are large birds—some as
     heavy as one hundred pounds—they gather tremendous momentum. They spin around and
     around and around. The one who gets dizzy first is the loser. They keep going until
     there is a loser. They don’t stop until then.”
    She opened her eyes and smiled at him. Her face was cunning again, it was
     canny.
    “Do you see?”
    He did not see. He thought she might have lost her mind.
    A FTER SHE TOLD the
     story about the Rheas, Tom began to think his father might marry the girl after all. The
     girl being the last remaining symbol of his power. The girl whom he would legitimate for
     this reason. It would happen the way a bank transfer happened. In material terms the
     ring would stay on her finger. Meanwhile the attachment it represented would transfer
     from one man to the other. It would be personally humiliating but Tom was used to being
     humiliated. He could have lived with it.
    But this—he looks at the wagon. He watches his father check the
     ropes one last time. This abandonment, by all of them—it is worse than the
     nightmares that plague him at night. Jose leads three horses out from the stable. A pair
     to pull the wagon and his father’s best horse. The old man mounts the expensive
     animal, the horse likely worth more than the farm at this point. He circles the wagon
     and goes to the girl, who has finished the tin of lobster. He takes the empty tin from
     her and hands it to one of the servants.
    They are going. It is happening! It cannot be stopped. Nothing Tom can do
     will be enough to make the old man stay. Jose climbs aboard the wagon and whips the
     horses to life. They strain and pull and the wagon creaks. They move an inch and then a
     foot. The horses have never been made to carry such weight. Jose whips the pair again
     and at last they bear the wagon away. His father rides alongside. He does not look at
     his son as he goes.
    Tom watches as the cart and horse move down the track.
     Two days ago his father had said to him—two days, it has only been two days, since
     his father announced that he was leaving. He had come to the shed, where Tom was
     cleaning the tack. It was dark and there were soft drifts of ash still on the floor and
     on the shelves.
    “Thomas.”
    He had stopped at the sound of the old man’s voice.
    “We’re going.”
    Carefully, he put down the bridle and harness.
    “We—”
    “Carine and I.”
    He turned to face the old man in the darkness. Both of them black from
     lack of light.
    “Where?”
    “To the city.”
    “For how